


the sea is a good place to think of the future

by JaguarCello



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Anorexia, Bulimia, Coffee, Drunk Texting, Eating Disorders, F/M, Fluff, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Self-Medication, Sherlock loves museums let's not lie, Sherlock-centric, orthorexia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-26
Updated: 2015-01-26
Packaged: 2018-03-09 03:39:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,188
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3234899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JaguarCello/pseuds/JaguarCello
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock has been struggling.<br/>(That's ridiculously reductive. Sherlock is plummeting back down the rabbit hole, and all John can do is watch, really. That's the way Sherlock wants it. Obviously.)<br/>His eating is becoming a non-event, and nobody has noticed at all, and that's the way he wants it. Alone protects him, doesn't it?</p>
            </blockquote>





	the sea is a good place to think of the future

**Author's Note:**

> trigger warnings, obviously. Read the tags, kids. 
> 
> Eating disorders are shitty and tragic and they ruined my life. If you're struggling, or if you're worried, feel free to talk to me, please please please. Nobody should have to go through this alone. 
> 
> my [ask](http://www.francisabernathy.tumblr.com/ask) is here on tumblr, or on twitter I'm [here](https://twitter.com/sepuIchraI).

The tap was dripping again. He knew that that wasn’t the problem here, but he and John sat in stony silence as it splashed in the dishes in the sink. The clock had stopped, and it occurred to Sherlock that the issue here was the way in which the kitchen was noisy; it was back-to-front, as if a child had pieced it together with only a vague idea of which part of the room made which sound. He had not been a child with only vague ideas. He had been a child with a grim ( _morbid_ , said Mycroft in a voice in his head) fascination with _everything_ , and later just with _food_.  

Food was surprisingly not the root of the silence. Sherlock had not eaten in seventy-nine hours and, whilst still healthy, his BMI was dropping back into the danger zone. Doctors like the BMIs of former food fuck-ups to be above twenty as a rule, and his was hovering at nineteen. _So close_ , his traitorous heart whispered, and the fridge began to hum, as if the thrill in his veins had taken on a solid form.

 John cleared his throat, and Sherlock almost started at the sound. He threaded his long fingers together, steepled them like mimicking a church would make his prayers any more heard, and looked at his brother.

John cleared his throat again, and snapped open the ring-pull on his can of Coke. “It wasn’t funny,” he said, and took a sip. Sherlock imagined the sugar fizzing on his tongue, settling around his heart, and shook his head ever so slightly. John’s eyes flickered at the movement. “Jesus _Christ_ , Sherlock, you fucking tackled a murderer,” and Sherlock looked him in the eyes for the first time since they had sat down. The fridge stopped humming.

“He was dangerous,” he began, recognising in the set of John’s jaw that there was an argument brewing. “He had a gun –“

John slammed his Coke can on the table, sloshing its contents all over his hand. He closed his eyes for a second, and when he opened them Sherlock was reminded of the captain he used to be. “Yeah, that’s why you leave it to the fucking armed response boys, you arrogant sod,” he said, teeth clenched, as he got up to wash his hands. “Drink your fucking Coke, you need the sugar,” he added, wiping his hands on his trousers and turning the tap a little too far. The dripping stopped.

“You’re swearing far more than normal,” Sherlock noted mildly, but opened his Coke too. The movement appealed to him ( _of course_ ), perfect in its precision, but he felt his stomach swoop in dread. The tap started dripping again. “We’ll have to get someone in to deal with that,” he said, gesturing, as John sat back down wearily.

“The great Sherlock Holmes, refusing to do something himself?” John muttered, and then looked up. “Are you _ill_ , or something? Had enough adrenaline for one day, you mad bastard?”

Sherlock shrugged, a carefully practiced movement perfected in the mirror. He did not suit casual, or so he had been told. “Shouldn’t you be getting back to Mary? After all, we’ve established that you’re just as drawn to danger as I am. Plus, she’s cooking gammon and chips for dinner,” he said, thoughts flickering to the single plate gathering dust in the cupboard above the microwave.

John looked at the clock, and huffed out a laugh. “Clock’s stopped, but then you’ve probably noticed,” and he stood, re-tying a shoelace.

“You don’t want to be late,” Sherlock said. “The woman next door but one to you two is a week overdue and about to give birth, and I think you and Mary would benefit from the experience,” and John rolled his eyes.

“I don’t even _want_ to know how you worked that one out,” he said. “Show-off or not, it probably involved urine samples at the very least,” but he picked up his coat from the rack by the door.

“Eat something,” he said as a parting shot, and left.

The tap dripped. Sherlock flopped down on the sofa upside-down, head just resting on the floor, and felt the blood in his temples begin to pound. He wondered idly (not idly) just how much blood in his head would cause unconsciousness or even it to explode, and made a mental note to ask Molly.

Stalking through the flat like a hunter after a stag, he gathered all the food in a cardboard box left over from when John had moved out again. Cup-a-soups (tomato, fifteen boxes each comprising five packets), olives (two jars, in brine), a wilted packet of baby spinach (almost certainly Mary’s, and moulding), spaghetti hoops (seven tins), lentils (only a handful), some cayenne pepper, a loaf of bread (seeded bloomer), and a packet of tortilla wraps (definitely Mary’s, and stale) went into the box. He surveyed the collection, looked back at the empty cupboards and nodded to himself. The box went on top of the kitchen units, so that it was half-hidden by a blender used only for science. It had a label: for science only, for the love of god, written by John in a blue felt-tip pen. Sherlock snorted to himself, and made a cup of tea.

 The hunger hummed in his veins, behind his cheeks, under his skull. It tore at his skin like a wolf tears at its prey, and he let himself be torn. He did not break.

Dawn came suddenly the next day, or so it seemed to him; he had not moved from the sofa since the tea had grown cold. He got up, a little stiffly, and rolled his shoulders experimentally; beds were better, he confirmed, and boiled the kettle again. When the hunger came howling, he had a cigarette, sucking in the smoke until his lungs felt they would burst. Sherlock imagined his demons dancing in the half-light that had begun to shine through the curtains; dust-motes spiralled in the air along with the smoke, and the steam from the kettle surprised him when it licked up his wrist from behind him.

He rolled up his sleeves, examined the fine scars that crisscrossed his arms, and read his story on his skin. The track marks, faded now, from when he still had veins to use there; the burns from cigarettes, the slices from razorblades, all were a strange (morbid, muttered Mycroft in his head again) reminder that he was somehow still alive. He looked again at the dust-motes, and picked up his violin for the first time in months. The bow leaped and dived over the strings, rosin dusting his hands and his dressing-gown, and he made another cup of tea, scribbling notes on the back of an old receipt. The receipt was for a hat he had bought for John a few Christmases ago, and he tried to ignore the sharp stab of pain that this caused. _Sociopath_ , he reminded himself, and he almost believed it.

The doorbell rang. He waited for a while and hoped that they might go away.

After half an hour, it rang again.


End file.
